Once you’d jumped through the hoops and passed everything, you took charge of the watch when the senior man was on leave or sick. You usually worked with the same people and get to know them pretty well. When the watch was short, it could be filled on overtime. You’d find yourself working with guys you didn’t really know.
This guy’s just back from his training course. Pukka procedure. Time and a place for it, as they say. But he’s been a Chief Petty Officer in the Navy. Mentioned in dispatches in the Falklands. So he’s got kind of used to getting a bit of authority into his voice on the VHF.
We get this wee shout on channel sixteen. ‘Hello Stornoway Coastguard, can you ring this number in Bernera? Can you do that for me? Over.’
I see his Adam’s apple twitch under the microphone attached to the headset. So I catch his eye and stroll over before he gets his oar in. I know his script. Would have followed it myself, maybe at the trainee stage of the career. You come over as pompous because you don’t know you’re twitchy. Something like, ‘That’s Commercial Traffic. Call Hebrides Radio on channel two-six. Over.’
Instead I strolled over to the channel sixteen desk. ‘Ask him what’s up.’
‘Mallard, this is Stornoway Coastguard. What’s your situation? Over.’
‘Yes, Coastguard, Mallard here. Thanks for coming back. Well, the gearbox is packed in and we might need a tow. Over.’
‘Mallard, Stornoway Coastguard. What is your position? Over.’
They’re talking now but I catch my Number One in the new gold braid and Persil Automatic shirt looking bloody amazed as I hit the Scramble button. Fair do’s, he doesn’t show it in the voice, just a wee bristle but when there’s a wee break and he catches his breath he gives me a ‘You’re in charge but…’
I stop him short. ‘We’ll talk about it later.’ And when there’s a lull, I add, ‘By the way, you’ve just heard the West Side Mayday.’
He’s thinking of wind strength and direction, glancing at the white-boards. If it’s an offshore wind, that strength, what’s the problem? The new boy’s used to a few thousand gross registered tonnes under his arse. Hundreds of guys to run around the ship.
The West Side’s different. The boys are throwing out creels there, as close to the reefs as they can get. Drying bastards, breaking bastards and every other kind of bit of brick. Doesn’t have to be a lot of wind, in from Old Hill. There’s something to collide with, any way you drift.
I ring the number in Bernera. A woman says she’ll get a hold of her husband on channel eight. Should be all right.
The chopper’s on scene in half an hour. ‘Disregard the vessel’s report of Force Four,’ they say. ‘A lot of white down there. Not very good conditions. Gusting over thirty knots. We’ll stick around here till the tow’s connected.’
It took about an hour before the ‘return-to-base’. The boys got it sorted out between themselves, this time. No further assistance.
Couple of weeks later the Mallard breaks up. The guy’s OK. He drifted onto one of the countless skerries in West Loch Roag. It all happened too fast to get on the radio. He got ashore on a reef that wasn’t going to cover too soon. He was picked up from there.
Bits of blue-green fibreglass were getting swept up from Barvas to Cape Wrath. The gearbox again.